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The Mountains of Indiana: A Story of Disdain

Long-time readers know I have a tendency to act bitter and vindictive mostly for entertainment purposes; sometimes I really am bitter and vindictive for various reasons, but usually I just enjoy being mean. Not mean-for-meanness sake like Bluto or something; I just don’t take life seriously enough to get worked up over much, yet I find it entertaining when others do, so I try to provoke those feelings. It’s not one of my better traits, but it is one I’ve tried to work on (often with unfortunate results). Once in awhile, though, people stumble into my crosshairs and turn into an arch-nemesis, usually without even knowing it. Would I really announce an arch-nemesis to the person? That’s not how I roll; I prefer to quietly plot their demise while maintaining a ruse of friendship. I believe it’s a strategy laid down in Machiavelli’s The Prince, but I might have that confused with Crazy from the Heat by David Lee Roth.

I’m sure it won’t surprise anybody that I managed to gain an arch-nemesis I’d never even met. Back when I was reading for The Manager, he sent me two or three scripts by this particular writer — certainly, all of them were bad in a variety of ways, but one in particular has gone down in history as the worst script I’ve ever read. Worse than Monster Truck Madness, even. There’s no denying the shitastrophe of MTM, but at least it made sense. It justified its existence as a clothesline for lazy jokes and gave off an overpowering “Rob Schneider star vehicle” stench that made me suspect that it really could get made.

The script by this writer — nobody could make it, because everybody involved in the project would lapse into a coma when it came time to unravel the storyline and figure out just what the hell is going on within those pages. I am a big — huge — fan of conspiracy stories, but this shit didn’t even attempt to make sense. It garnered from me a tour de force of coverage, epic in length and attention to detail, featuring an explosive commentary that undid every attempt at a plot twist, every false characterization, every baffling loose end — something I’m so proud of to this day that I would like to believe the very mention of this coverage prompts a weary moment of silence, with anyone in earshot quivering with either terror or ecstasy (maybe both).

I don’t mind spilling the secrets of the “plot,” but I am trying to keep things on the down-low. It’s already easy enough to tie me back to The Manager, so spilling the names of his theoretical clients, the titles of the work, character names — any easily Googled keyword — will be stripped. I don’t trust myself in going the extra mile to alter significant plot details with a similar lack of coherence — I don’t want to be accused of going over the top or of libeling someone when it’s my own crappy writing and not his, so here it goes:

SYNOPSIS: Ten years ago, 17-year-old JOHN watches his father LARRY make a drug deal with mobster VITO DELFINO. In the present, TED GREENWALT works at a car wash. He’s poor, his wife SARAH is fed up with him, and it seems most of his life is spent at a bar with friends LUKE and ETHAN. When Ted forgets “date night,” Sarah locks herself in the den, leaving Ted to sleep alone. He has what he thinks is a dream of going to an exclusive yacht party, driving a Mercedes, owning a mansion, and sleeping with gorgeous MAYA. Everyone keeps calling him “David,” and he runs into Vito Delfino at the party. When Ted wakes up the next morning in the mansion, he realizes it’s all true. He also realizes gunmen are after him, though he doesn’t know why. He leaves Maya and goes back to his “real” life — except with the Mercedes, which he shows off to all his friends and co-workers. In the Mercedes he finds an address scratched on the back of a business card. This starts an investigation — at the address he finds MONTGOMERY, a singer from the party the previous night. Montgomery doesn’t know who he is or what he wants and asks Ted to leave. Ted tries to piece together the events of last night, revealed through flashbacks. He also recalls through flashbacks the events of 10 years ago — getting into a car accident with his six-year-old son Mark and Larry’s son, John.

To impress angry Sarah, Ted shows her the Mercedes and takes her to the mansion. He claims an uncle died and left it all to him. Sarah finds a receipt for the Olympic Hotel and demands an explanation. Ted lies, saying he wanted to give her the option of a mansion or a cheap motel. Later that night, Ted gets a call from Luke. Ted meets him at the bar, but when he mistakes an attractive girl for Maya, he freaks out and leaves. In the Mercedes, a Town Car with a Gunman driving pulls up alongside Ted. This leads to a chase, from which Ted narrowly escapes. Back at the mansion, Sarah’s gone — she found Maya’s bra from the previous night and left an angry note. Ted goes to spend the night at Luke’s. He’s awakened a few hours later by COPS who have come to check out the noise. Ted leaves the others sleeping and sneaks out the back door. At his apartment, Ted finds an angry message from Sarah on their answering machine. He also discovers it’s being watched by the Town Car. Ted sneaks away in the Mercedes and goes to the docks where the yacht party was held. He bribes the VALET for information, and he gives Ted Maya’s address. The Town Car shows up and Ted makes another difficult escape. He goes back to his apartment and has an awkward moment with Sarah. Ted drives to Malibu to find Maya. She says odd things that imply she knows more about the situation than she’s letting on. Two ATVs chase after them. Ted and Maya hop in the Mercedes and outrun them to the freeway. The ATVs fire rockets at them. Ted takes a downtown exit, and Nina forces them to stop—right in front of the Olympic Hotel. He realizes Maya is probably in on the whole thing when he recognizes her shoes — a pair identical to one he saw at Montgomery’s home. They come across Sarah at the hotel. She’s not pleased to see Ted with Maya. They argue, and she stalks off. Ted and Maya take a cab to Montgomery’s house and find it empty, abandoned. A HITMAN comes to take them out. Ted manages to get away, but Maya isn’t so lucky.

Ted goes to the police, a SERGEANT BECKER, to report getting shot at. Becker points out Ted’s picture on a wanted poster, with the name “DAVID HARBOROUGH,” wanted in connection with the death of Vito Delfino. Ted convinces Becker that he has the wrong man — Ted isn’t “David Harborough.” Becker runs Ted’s license and grudgingly lets him go. Ted — at this point looking like a bum — manages to get a lawyer’s business card. He goes to a department store to buy new clothes, gets himself all decked-out and smooth-looking, and returns to the police station. He speaks with DETECTIVE SAMSA, saying he’s Delfino’s lawyer. Samsa doesn’t believe him. Ted returns to the apartment, where Sarah shows him separation papers. She’s kidnapped almost immediately. The police bust in and search his place. They find the bloody knife that killed Delfino. They arrest Ted, who calls Luke and has him use David Harborough’s financial resources to bail him out. Once out, Ted realizes several things: he actually did kill Delfino (but was set up), when he was in the car accident that killed Mark and John it was because John had stolen drugs from Larry that belonged to Delfino, they were run off the road by Montgomery (who worked for Delfino) — and Larry is behind the whole current setup. Ted finally has to spill the beans — apparently he told Larry that John ran off to join the navy, and he told Sarah that Mark was kidnapped. He admits what happened, then pins it all on Montgomery (who’s helping Larry). Larry is so angry that he causes another car accident. Ted wakes up in the hospital, with Sarah in the next bed. Maya shows up, explains that she helped because Larry was her father, and emphasizes that Ted should be paying attention to his wife.

ANALYSIS: On the positive side: the opening exposition that establishes Ted’s character — his daily routine, his habit of lying, his marital problems, etc. — that all works pretty well. The reappearance of Sarah periodically to continue that conflict also works, building toward that resolution where Ted can finally value his wife at the end.

However, this screenplay is packed to the gills with logic problems that render the story first incomprehensible, then just plain frustrating:

• When Ted wakes up to the sounds of gun-toting scumbags beating on his door and has to make a deft escape, why does he think it’s a good idea to take his wife back there? Especially when he didn’t even bother to remove the “evidence” of his infidelity the night before.
• If I understand the basic conspiracy, it goes like this: to avenge his son, Larry wanted to not just frame Ted for Delfino’s death — he wanted to get Ted into a drugged state where he’d actually commit the crime. The ultimate goal, one assumes, is so that Larry can get some justice. It’s never really clear why Larry wants Delfino dead, why Montgomery would go along with his father’s murder, or why they’d send people to try and kill Ted when their main goal is to have him arrested and convicted of murder. Is that not their goal? If not, what’s the point of setting up the whole conspiracy in the first place? Why not just kill Ted?
• In the same vein, what’s the purpose of providing Ted/”David” with a mansion, a fancy car, credit cards, etc.? All he has to do is exactly what he does: go back home, go back to work, realize this is a “fake” life. They go to great expense to get Ted to “accept” this fake life, but they don’t think he’d be curious enough about how he got this life to find out any information? Even if he has no interest in details, sending mercenaries to hunt Ted down seems like it’d make even the least curious person just a little bit interested in what’s going on with this fake life.
• They also provide Ted with just enough clues to put together the whole conspiracy, which seems like it’d be the antithesis of what they want. People going to the trouble and expense of creating an identity out of thin air (especially a “wealthy playboy” identity) would hopefully be smart enough to tie up loose ends like having key players’ addresses written down, hotel receipts in pockets, etc.
• The mysterious house in the Hollywood Hills. It seems like an odd setup that’s never cleared up. Is this where Montgomery actually lives? Did he clear out as soon as he knew Ted was on to him? As written, it’s an intentional layer of mind-fucking, but to what end? The visits to that house are more helpful than any other clue in Ted figuring out the conspiracy, so what’s going on there needs to be made clear.
• Sergeant Becker scoffs at Ted for giving what he assumes is a fake ID. When he runs it and finds out it’s real, he gets angry but lets Ted go. He doesn’t think that, perhaps, “David Harborough” is an alias? Or that “David” pasted his picture onto Ted’s real driver’s license (therefore all the information would check out)? Or that a guy accused of murdering a known mobster would have the resources to create plenty of legitimate-but-fake IDs in police databases? Why would Becker let him go?
• From the beginning of the script, it’s clear that Ted lies constantly, but he’s possibly the worst liar I’ve ever seen. It’s very difficult to believe he could have kept the charade involving John and Mark going for any length of time. Even if he did — why? Obviously Larry is fond of blood-vendettas, but considering how easily he accepts that Ted was pushed off the road by somebody else because John had his cocaine, Larry could put two and two together and realize Ted’s telling the truth. Ted can feel guilty all he wants, but he wasn’t responsible for the accident. Even the police (who obviously handled the situation; Larry mentions a police report) didn’t find him responsible/negligent, so why the big cover-up? I’m not saying he doesn’t have to cover it up or lie about it, but (a) make him a better liar, and (b) make it clear exactly why he felt he needed to lie to both Sarah and Larry about their kids for a decade.
• Big loose end: Ted actually killed Delfino (didn’t he? if not, that’s unclear). Sure, he survives and unravels the conspiracy, but he’s still got a murder rap to beat. Considering Ted actually did the crime, this might not be easy. Where’s the resolution?

Aside from this, another big problem pops up on page one: the short scene involving John, Larry, and Delfino. It makes everything too obvious — we know it’s going to come back to those three in the end. By the time we realize John is most likely dead in a car accident (which is obvious long before it’s fully shown to be true) and Delfino was murdered recently, the Larry reveal is pretty obvious. There’s nobody else it could be.

It seems kind of silly that Montgomery is Delfino’s son, and as I pointed out it creates a logic problem as far as why he’d allow Delfino’s murder to take place. Making him hired muscle, willing to do anything for the highest bidder, makes it far more believable and loses the necessity for an explanation for why he wants Delfino dead; his only loyalty is to money, so Delfino doesn’t matter. It’s also a little too neat and tidy that not only is he Delfino’s son, but Maya is Larry’s daughter. It oversimplifies the motivations — both Montgomery and Maya are willing to commit crimes (or force others to commit crimes) out of nothing but family loyalty? It diminishes their characters by not giving them any ulterior motives or shades of gray.

I don’t usually go on that long. It’s usually two or three short paragraphs for the synopsis, then one or two paragraphs of analysis. When a story relies on so many little details to make it such dreck, you need the detail or else the feedback makes no sense. I also wanted to get the point across, this being the third and worst script I had read from this writer, that he doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing. Here is one area where the bitter-‘n’-vindictive kicks in. I’ll admit a slight tinge of jealousy that somebody so bad could be a “client,” while I was slaving away as an “intern.” Of course, the more I found out about The Manager, the happier I was keeping my distance.

If nothing else, The Manager took the hint — I never received another script from this writer. Also, my friend Mark got a rewrite of this same script that incorporated many of my suggestions, but it was still a disaster. Poor feedback, or poor writing? You be the judge!

Why did I get so angry, though? Surface-wise, I’ve read worst scripts — scripts written by people whose grasp of the English language (despite being born-and-bred Americans) is so poor that trying to figure out what they’re trying to say is an act of futility, comedies so unfunny I can’t even fathom the mind that would put the “jokes” to paper, action scripts that try to coast on a brilliant first 15 pages while circling the drain for the next 60 before just bottoming out. I’ve managed to read an entire gamut of awful shit sent to shady men with no credentials, only because “accepts unsolicited material” is written in the ad. The problem with this script, the reason I got so angry, was the raw potential. The man can string together a sentence. He can write decent dialogue. He even has a fairly good sense of characterization, and a shitload of ambition crammed into his scripts. The end result is messy as hell, and adding insult to injury — he doesn’t learn from mistakes. Each screenplay I read had the same kinds of problems, over and over again, despite the feedback I (and others, I’m sure) gave.

After I quit reading for The Manager, I tried to keep track of some of the more memorably offensive authors (some of whom were general submissions, not “clients”). Most of them have blogs and/or MySpace pages I can read for the bitter-‘n’-vindictive, but it came as a huge, coronary-inducing shock that the author of the screenplay mentioned above had a novel coming out.

A novel?! From this guy?! How?! My first thought was that he is as depraved and deceptive as I am, creating a fake publishing company (in fact, he’s the one who gave me the idea) to perpetuate the myth that he’s published. No dice — this is actually a real place, to my unending horror.

Weeks passed between my discovery and the novel’s publication, and my rage and confusion softened. It was replaced with an odd, dewy sensation I’ve come to know as “hope.” Yes, I put my prejudices aside and reminded myself — this guy is a fellow writer. Maybe screenplays aren’t the medium for him; maybe he needs the the authoritarian control and added details only the novel form can provide. All the elaborate twists and confusing characters will make sense thanks to the magic of internal thought and droning, ponderous explanations — material bad screenwriters think of as excess fat (Syd Field agrees!) and good screenwriters know how to work around.

In a show of meaningless solidarity, I bought the book the day it came out and started a-reading.

And it was a-awful.

My change of heart made me want it to be good so badly that I tried to ignore the initial flaws and hope he’d find his groove and by the end, I’d be waiting breathlessly for his sophomore effort. About 50 pages into it, I was already ready to give up. Let me describe the very, very basic plot: a disparate group of people from all over the U.S., for various reasons, set out to find a girl. They don’t know why, but they feel compelled to search for her, if only to figure out why she’s turned into the object of their obsession.

At the very least, it’s an interesting premise. Here’s the biggest problem: there is no real plot (for 300 of its 330 pages, it’s just people wandering around for no clear reason), which is fine if you can rely on interesting and unique characters to carry the story. You…can’t. He gives each character one (maybe two, if we’re lucky) trait that carries them through the book. They aren’t even interesting traits. “This guy’s a secret cutter.” That’s his entire character. We find out little else about him, or anyone else, over the course of the book. It’s supposed to be a journey of discovery, I guess, but it fails so spectacularly there’s a tacked-on epilogue explaining to us, in blunt terms, how they changed.

Aside from that, there are big story and character questions that all pretty much boil down to: why would anyone, real or fictional, do that? With no explanations, we’re left to guess, and most of my guesses ended up as “sloppy writing and no research.” I could go on and on, in detail, but none of it is terribly important. I’ll sum up some of the typical goofiness by using as an example a few early scenes:

One of the characters dials a phone number for no apparent reason (in fairness, it’s not apparent to the character, either — that much is fairly interesting). When he gets somebody on the line who sounds like she’s been kidnapped, he calls the cops. Later, a police detective forces two uniforms to break into his home while he’s showering. Again, to his credit, he at least questions the legality of them breaking in — but never explains what would motivate them to do this. It’s an unnecessary (and, again, illegal) action, made even more confusing by a few questionable police procedure actions. Now, I know not every detective has a partner, but this doesn’t mean the ones who don’t are given uniformed cops as foot soldiers to break and enter for them or act as secretaries. In a later scene, these same uniforms show up at his office…to take him upstairs to a conference room where the plainclothes detective is waiting. Why? Don’t they have parking tickets to hand out?

It’s compounded by the illogic of what happens next: the guy goes back to his cubicle, and his boss tells him if the police show up again, he’s fired. This is a man who hasn’t committed a crime, who is helping the police as a concerned citizen, and the whole exchange makes it more difficult to believe the uniforms have any purpose for being there (other than to cause this dust-up). I could understand the boss getting flustered if the dude had a record, or if he was getting arrested, or if the boss had it in for the character — there are plenty of explanations for all of these things, but we are provided with none. It’s difficult to maintain suspension of disbelief when there is little attention to detail, and we can’t believe the broad strokes we’re given.

And then there are the mountains of Indiana. You heard me right, and any Illinoisian who has driven to obscene corners of that rural state looking for the finest illegal fireworks and unconventional (some might say “physics-defying”) pornography knows full well: while there may be more than corn in Indiana, there sure as hell aren’t mountains. Yet, the climactic point in the book occurs in a small town nestled in “the mountains of Indiana.” Look, I’ve read a couple of reviews that make the (misguided) case that anything that doesn’t make sense (plenty of it!) can be chalked up to a David Lynch-like surrealism. How can you read anything about mountains of Indiana and not agree that it’s a mess of poor research and inattention to detail? The book does nothing to draw attention to the strageness of this imagery (or any of the other notable examples of “surrealism”), and the story could easily take place in a region that is authentically mountainous. I’m a big fan of ironic throwaway lines, or even a placid little, “Such-and-such had never been to Indiana and didn’t realize how mountainous the terrain was” if he wants to maintain the leaden, Bergmanesque seriousness. Just something to address the fact that the author clearly has no idea what he’s talking about: he’s never been to Indiana, he’s never even heard of the stupid knobs!

I don’t know what he was trying to accomplish. If this was supposed to be a dream-like meditation on…something, there’s too much reality; if it’s supposed to be real, the book is sloppy and riddled with implausibility. My reading on it is that he was going for something along the lines of “magical realism,” in the very vague sense that “everything’s real until it’s not.” The book is loaded with very obvious moments of strangeness, heightened reality, things that can’t or shouldn’t happen — but it mostly tries to remain grounded in reality. Tries.

You might notice problems in this novel that crop up in the screenplay I talk about above. This is the main source of frustration: in the few interviews I’ve discovered online, he keeps mentioning how frequently he writes, but what does it mean if he’s not allowing himself to improve the craft? I’ve read four full pieces of work by this man, and all four of them have the same plausibility issues, lack of continuity, lack of payoff, and lack of authentic character development. It’s hugely disappointing and makes me a little happier to continue having this guy as an arch-nemesis.

I won’t deny this: part of my reaction comes from jealousy. He got published, legitimately (even if it’s a tiny press who will undoubtedly fold after this misstep), and I didn’t. But go back and re-read the part where I wanted this book to be good. Obviously I’m pissed because he got a piece of shit published, but not as much as you think — it actually makes me optimistic. Rather than going with tricks and fakery, this hunk of junk has me convinced I could get a legitimate novel published, at a bigger and better place. No, I think I’m really mad because I think this writer does have talent (I wouldn’t have made it through 330 pages if he didn’t); he just can’t or won’t learn from his mistakes, and he has an uncanny knack for generating a lot of goodwill at the beginning, then squandering it all by the end.

Posted by Stan on September 7, 2007 6:45 PM  | Permalink | Career-Based Rambling, Classic Issues | Digg It